Converse gathered Kid Cudi, Bethany Cosentino from Best Coast and Rostam Batmanglij from Vampire Weekend to make a collaboration song called “All Summer“. I admire and respect each of these artists individually, and combining them together is just an explosion of love. Each of these artist’s styles are present. “All Summer” is the perfect indie-pop summer song, but it’s one of those songs that stay for a bit and you forget about it in a couple of months.

Watch a short 2 minute interview of each of these amazing people and download the track on their website here, or download below:

Kid Cudi, Best Coast, Rostam Batmanglij – “All Summer”

Vampire Weekend’s videos are getting more and more interesting – there was “Cousins” which had the band travelling back and forth from an alley. There was “Giving Up The Gun” which featured star-studded celebrities playing tennis.

The boys of Vampire Weekend dressed up as medieval characters and pranced around L.A. (or maybe Florida? IDK) with hot babes, going through the In and Out drive-through and applying lip chap to the video for “Holiday”. Enjoy.

I meant to post this when it came out but I kept on forgetting. Anyways, apparently some guy found the members of Vampire Weekend in a bar in Barcelona and eventually convinced them to play a house party, and they did! Missing was Rostam, I wonder where he was.

Vampire Weekend, please play at my house when you come next week!

The Hood Internet made a mashup of our favorite songs, M.I.A.’s “Sunshowers” from ‘Arular’ and Vampire Weekend’s “Giving up the Gun“. The mashup flows perfectly, and even Rostam from Vampire Weekend admits that it’s the ‘best mashup I’ll ever hear in my life’.

I wish they added in Ezra’s singing though, it would’ve sounded better. But this is already good enough. Two thumbs up, The Hood Internet!

M.I.A. vs Vampire Weekend – “Giving up the Sunshowers” (The Hood Internet Mashup)Stream

In M.I.A. news, apparently she’s banned from leaving the U.S. and her family is banned from going to the U.S. What did she do and why can’t she visit her family? I find this odd. From her Twitter:

“BANNED FROM LEAVING THE U.S, FAMILY BANNED FROM COMING TO U.S TO SEE ME , BABY, RECORDING LP, SIGNING THE DOPEST ACTS THATS HITTIN 2010″

And also, It’s rumored that her new album will be coming out this June because of these twitter messages:

“I THINK IM READY”, “JUNE 2010″

Vampire Weekend have been blowing up in both alternative and mainstream media lately. ‘Contra’ was even the 12th #1 independently distributed album in the states, after Radiohead and Pearl Jam.

In the music video for “Giving Up The Gun”, the band headed toward a futuristic minimalistic look with some girl as a tennis player playing against Jake Gyllenhaal and Joe Jonas, and also appearances by RZA and Lil Jon. I didn’t mind the Jake Gyllenhaal cameo, I actually thought that was witty. But Joe Jonas? You’ve got to be kidding me.

Click the above video to go look at the Youtube comments. Joe Jonas fans are DISSING Vampire Weekend and making fun of hipsters. Jonas fans are coming to watch the video, appreciate the fact that he’s in short shorts, and then later diss the song. They even say ‘I love Joe Jonas, but what the hell”, while we’re saying ‘I love Vampire Weekend, but what the hell”.

I guess they tried to collaborate a bit and see what fans think and we’re all agreeing that this wasn’t a good idea. It’s another sign that Vampire Weekend are indeed selling out.

LOL.

Last week when Vampire Weekend stopped by BBC Radio 1 they covered Rancid’s “Ruby Soho“. I haven’t heard this song in such a long time and it was refreshing to hear them cover it and make it their own.

I can tell Rancid fans and punk fans are not loving this…but I do. It’s such a fun pop-py cover, and totally their style. As a Vampire Weekend fan, I approve.

Vampire Weekend – “Ruby Soho” (Rancid Cover)Stream

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I haven’t heard about it until now, and it’s called “Giant” now. Serving as a b-side/ bonus track on Contra, the song definitely fits into the Contra sound. After listening to it on Youtube, it looks like they didn’t make any major changes to it.

You may have noticed something wrong with the first sentence of this post. “I’ve never seen Vampire Weekend live.” This might be the second time that I’m saying this on the blog, but they’re coming to Edmonton and I am DEFINITELY going. BOO YA.

Vampire Weekend – “Giant”Stream

Yesterday night Vampire Weekend performed “Cousins” on David Letterman, and Ezra even added in some special effects such as ‘distorting’ or ‘compressing’ his vocals during the performance.

I was reading some of the comments on Youtube on this video, and some person claimed that they are using autotune. They are in fact, not. Can’t you hear it? I also read another comment that went like this:

“I listened to Contra… I didnt think I would like it. Its a good techno album but, like all sophomore albums, (or so it would seem) this one doesn’t really hit me like the first one did.”

Uhh…what? Vampire Weekend is not techno at all…not even close. What the hell are you talking about?

The band has also released their winter/spring tour dates for Contra. Keep on reading to see them:

THEY ARE COMING TO EDMONTON!!!! I am so glad…I’ve been waiting for this moment forever. This is so exciting. Hopefully I will be able to get a hold of an interview…

01-12 Los Angeles, CA – Henry Fonda Theater
01-17 New York, NY – United Palace Theater *
01-18 New York, NY – Webster Hall !
01-19 New York, NY – Bowery Ballroom #
02-05 Bexhill, England – De La Warr
02-07 Cambridge, England – Corn Exchange
02-08 Manchester, England – Manchester Apollo
02-09 Leeds, England – Leeds O2 Academy
02-10 Birmingham, England – Birmingham O2 Academy
02-12 Newcastle, England – Newcastle O2 Academy
02-13 Glasgow, Scotland – Barrowlands
02-14 Edinburgh, Scotland – Edinburgh Picture House
02-16 London, England – Brixton O2 Academy
02-17 London, England – Brixton O2 Academy
02-19 Berlin, Germany – Astra
02-20 Cologne, Germany – Gloria
02-21 Hamburg, Germany – Uebel or Gefaehrlich
02-22 Brussels, Belgium – AB
02-24 Amsterdam, Netherlands – Paradiso
02-25 Paris, France – Olympia
02-26 Toulouse, France – Le Bikini
02-27 Barcelona, Spain – Penelope
02-28 Madrid, Spain – Teatro Circo Price
03-14 Edmonton, Alberta – Edmonton Event Centre
03-15 Calgary, Alberta – MacEwan Hall
03-16 Missoula, MT – Wilma Theatre
03-18 Salt Lake City, UT – In the Venue
03-19 Denver, CO – Ogden Theatre
03-20 Aspen, CO – Spring Jam Core Party
03-22 Minneapolis, MN – First Avenue
03-23 Milwaukee, WI – Riverside Theatre
03-25 Chicago, IL – Riviera Theatre
03-27 Knoxville, TN – Tennessee Theatre
03-29 Columbus, OH – The LC Pavilion
03-30 Toronto, Ontario – The Sound Academy
04-01 Boston, MA – Orpheum Theatre
04-02 Philadelphia, PA – Electric Factory
04-03 Washington, DC – DAR Constitution Hall
04-05 Nashville, TN – Ryman Auditorium
04-06 Asheville, NC – Orange Peel
04-08 Atlanta, GA – The Tabernacle
04-09 New Orleans, LA – House of Blues
04-10 Austin, TX – Stubb’s BBQ
04-11 Dallas, TX – House of Blues
04-13 Tempe, AZ – Marquee Theatre
04-14 Pomona, CA – Fox Theater
04-19 Oakland, CA – Fox Theater

I am listening to it as we speak and so far it is AWESOME.

Will from We All Want Someone To Shout For wrote an amazing review of the album. Check it out here.

‘Contra’ is released on the 12th in the USA and 11th in Europe via XL.

Who wouldn’t want the chance to remix the songs from the upcoming Vampire Weekend CD, Contra? Few, I’d think. Well Toyselectah has this opportunity. His ghetto-tech tropical style seems to fit in nicely with the theme of Contra and will no doubt be a happy marriage fitting for a dance filled evening fueled by Caribbean rum.

With the release of Contra being right around the corner(1/11/09) my anticipation level is currently through the roof. But now with the addition of these very different, yet astoundingly similar remixes my level goes from through the roof, to the moon! Check out this track from the CD which will be entitled Contra Megamelt and embrace all that is Toyselectah, combined with Vampire Weekend. Mmmm, It’s tasty!

Vampire Weekend – “Cousinz”(Toyselectah Mex-more Remix) Stream

Vampire Weekend is spotlighted in the “Already Famous” spread in Vogue magazine – who would’ve knew that they would be posing with Sasha Pivovarova!

Yesterday Vampire Weekend announced on their Twitter that they put their new song “White Sky” for stream on their Myspace so of course I had to check it out.

As you might have known they teased us and performed this song earlier this year on Jimmy Fallon. I still have an mp3 rip of the video because I thought it was THAT good. Now they’re teasing us yet once again by streaming the studio mp3 of it on their myspace before it’s on sale – and you know we had to share it.

Vampire Weekend – “White Sky”Stream